The Accountant (2016) review

Recently Ben Affleck has been attracting quite a lot of buzz for his turn as Batman in the DC Extended Universe. Obviously when he was first cast, there was a fair amount of controversy surrounding the announcement as many felt that Affleck just wasn’t suited for the role of the legendary DC Comics superhero, especially after his arguably disastrous previous turn in the superhero film genre with 2003’s Daredevil. However, while the first DC film that he starred in, this year’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, proved to be quite polarizing amongst critics and audiences, Affleck did receive rave reviews for his performance as an older and grizzled version of the Dark Knight. Thus, it’s safe to say that no matter how things turn out for the DCEU, Affleck certainly managed to prove many of the critics that initially doubted him wrong. So why am I bringing up Affleck’s recent work as Batman, you ask? Well that’s because his newest film, The Accountant, has him in a role that, in some ways, is kind of like Batman as he plays a character who could sort of be described as a ‘vigilante’ of some sorts. The film is brought to us by Gavin O’Connor, who in the past few years has been known for directing a pair of well-received sports films in 2004’s Miracle and 2011’s Warrior. And in this film, Affleck does deliver a very fascinating performance as a seemingly unassuming accountant with a background in military training. However, while Affleck does do a solid job in the lead role, the film ultimately hinders his performance due to its sluggishly slow pace.  

Christian Wolff (Ben Affleck) is a seemingly modest accountant operating a small accounting firm just outside of Chicago. However, for quite some time he has been pursued by the U.S. Federal Treasury, namely director of financial crimes Raymond King (J.K. Simmons) who ends up putting up-and-coming analyst Marybeth Medina (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) on the case (under threat of him exposing her criminal past) as he is about to retire, for getting involved with some of the biggest criminals in the world. As it turns out, Christian was diagnosed with autism as a child and was subsequently combat-trained for many years, primarily thanks to his father being a member of the military. Nowadays he spends much of his time operating as a forensic accountant for various criminal enterprises, with his assignments coming courtesy of a mysterious figure who he frequently communicates with known only as ‘The Voice’. One day, Christian takes on a legitimate accounting job for Living Robotics, a major robotics corporation run by CEO Lamar Blackburn (John Lithgow), and is tasked with investigating a supposed discrepancy in the company’s records. Christian, a math genius, figures out the problem almost immediately but this then puts him in big trouble as he must now go on the run along with Dana Cummings (Anna Kendrick), who was an in-house accountant for the company and the one who first discovered the discrepancy, from a group of assassins led by a mysterious figure named Braxton (Jon Bernthal) while also uncovering more of Living Robotics’ secrets.

From a technical perspective, The Accountant is, at the very least, a well-made film. The cinematography by Seamus McGarvey (Godzilla, The Avengers) is solid as is the editing during the action sequences. Plus, the score by Mark Isham, a frequent collaborator with director Gavin O’Connor, provides a suitably suspenseful aura throughout. However, the main thing that holds this film back is its overall pacing. Contrary to what the marketing might suggest, this is not an action-packed thriller. Sure, there are plenty of action sequences in this film but ultimately it’s more of a slow burn thriller as there are quite a lot of dialogue-heavy scenes. Because of this, it’s more of a character study than it is an action thriller and for the record that’s perfectly fine if this was the route that O’Connor and writer Bill Dubuque were trying to go with in terms of the story. Ultimately, though, I feel that the ‘character study’ elements were perhaps just a tad bit overdone here. There are just some scenes that drag on for way too long, like this one big monologue from J.K. Simmons’ character over his connection to Christian Wolff. Scenes like this slow the film down in the worst possible way to the point where it sometimes even hinders the emotional complexity of certain character moments. And while the plot itself is admittedly a simplistic one, some parts of it just aren’t handled very well, like the whole thing about Medina having a criminal past, which poses a huge risk to her career with the government because she lied about it on her resume; a felony offense. This should be a major bit of character development for her but it ultimately never gets brought up again after the first scene between her and King. In other words, it becomes entirely pointless in the grand scheme of things.

Because this is centered on an autistic main character, I’ve heard that some may find the film to be rather offensive in terms of its portrayal of autism because it implies that this makes people who have autism the ‘perfect candidates’ for becoming assassins. So, if you’re offended by the film because of this implication, that’s totally understandable. However, I think that the film does do a pretty decent job in terms of handling the main character’s struggle with autism whenever it’s away from the action. At the very least, the film does succeed in regards to making Christian a sympathetic character, a trained badass for sure but one who finds that it’s difficult to make a lot of human connections. Overall, Affleck is solid in the lead role and he’s easily the film’s greatest strength. The rest of the cast is solid as well, though their roles in the film are minor at best when compared to Affleck. Anna Kendrick’s character is basically just along for the ride once she gets dragged into Christian’s situation. Still, Kendrick does work well with Affleck whenever they’re on-screen together. Jon Bernthal is also great as the character Braxton, who we learn has a major connection to Christian. It could very well be argued that said connection is a rather predictable plot twist but I will say that it is one of the ‘better handled’ plot-points of the story overall. Everyone else… is basically just there; J.K. Simmons, John Lithgow, Jeffrey Tambor (who plays another criminally-tied accountant that Christian befriends while the two of them are in prison at one point), etc.

In short, don’t go into The Accountant expecting to see an action-packed thriller. Instead, it’s more of a ‘slow burn’ character study that focuses in on Affleck’s character and how he struggles with his autism. But while that part of the film is done well outside of the action sequences, especially thanks to Affleck’s solid performance in the role, the ‘slow burn’ pacing does prove to be quite a bit of a problem. Because the film is more dialogue-based than it is action-based, some scenes drag on for way too long, sometimes even to the point of hindering whatever emotions the plot was trying to convey. Bottom line, this film didn’t need to be over two hours long and could’ve benefitted from some tighter editing. Now again, if the intention was to make this film more of a character study than an action thriller, that’s fine. This could’ve been a nice subversion of the ‘action thriller’ genre. And from a technical standpoint, the film is at the very least well-made in terms of the action, music, direction, etc. Sadly, though, this turned out to be quite a disappointing affair, especially considering the talent involved both in front of and behind the camera.

Rating: 2.5/5